RFID Today and in the Future

1
RFID Today and in the Future Dr Peter Harrop,
Chairman p.harrop_at_idtechex.com
IDTechEx www.idtechex.com
2
IDTechEx is an independent strategic analyst on
RFID smart labels, printed electronics and smart
packaging. Our core services provide
3
An enabling technology may be very simple yet
incredibly useful

• A wheel
• Paper

4
RFID System Basics
5
Radio Frequency Identification RFID is an
enabling technology

• It uses an electronic reader to read data at a
  distance on small tags
• RFID has few problems of obscuration,
  orientation, speed or reading many at a time
• RFID automates things
• RFID is like the wheel or paper it is an
  enabling technology found (almost) everywhere.

6
RFID is used for very different purposes

• Healthcare anti-counterfeiting, locating people
  and assets
• Military mounting campaigns previously
  impossible
• Retail increased sales, reduced costs
• Financial and transportation faster, more
  secure transactions
• Animals accurate, fast, disease response,
  locating lost pets
• Library find lost books, automate procedures,
  anti-theft

7
The worlds supply chains are out of control

• CPG shrinkage is 2 - 60 billion yearly. ECR
  Europe
• 75 of the cost of a retail product is getting
  it there. MIT
• Up to 20 of foods are discarded due to spoilage
  through the supply chain. Food and Drug
  Administration
• Stockouts at retailers cost six percent of sales.
  One third of these are items in the retailers
  store.Procter Gamble 180 billion yearly

8

• The Consumer goods industry is 3 trillion yearly
  
• 1 trillion of this is unnecessary
• RFID can help tackle 400 billion yearly of this
  waste
• Theft, fraud, misplacement, expiry, delay, manual
  procedures, empty shelves, not knowing what the
  customer wants .

9
Retail/ military mandates for RFID on pallets
and cases 350 million tags in 2006
Wal-Mart (300Bn) RFID enabled 475 stores, 1000
by year end 300 suppliers tagging cases and
pallets of top products Currently receive 3
million tagged cases per week (May 06) Ordered
15,000 readers Massive payback for Wal-Mart Out
of Stocks reduced by up to 48 stores with RFID
63 more effective at replenishing items. No
payback for consumer goods suppliers. RFID
suppliers also losing money Major competitive
advantage for retailers
10
Retail Mandates
What does it mean for the brands? PG Fusion
blades sales increase 19 by timely arrival at
shelf Hanna Candle company 90 pallets worth
12.6M went missing but were found and knock on
effect for ordering Altria Group (97Bn), owner
of Miller, Kraft, Philip Morris Pallet/case
tagging is a pain barrier item level tagging is
our utopia With pallets/cases RFID can be a
solution looking for a problem especially low
value low margin goods. Some benefits so far but
it is a cruel world of unfair share and gain
11
Healthcare is in trouble

• Taking medicine incorrectly Medication
  non-compliance costs the US alone approximately
  100 billion and 125,000 deaths yearlyUS
  National Pharmaceutical Council
• Counterfeits Pharmaceuticals 10 (In third world
  30 - 40) Tens of thousands of deaths every year
• Industry estimates
• Errors10 of hospital patients suffer an adverse
  event. For example, in the US, there are 20,000
  mother baby mismatches yearly USDH

12
6. Percentage Non-Compliance
13
(No Transcript)
14
Item Level Tagging - happening faster than most
think - 200 million tags in 2006
Pfizer, Purdue Pharma, GlaxoSmithKline item level
tagging drugs 30 million EPC Marks Spencer
apparel 350M yearly from 2008 Non EPC to save
cost Books in libraries and retail - 55 million
mainly not EPC RFID Market 2006 by Tag Volume
Sold Pallet/case 0.35 billion Item 0.2
billion Other 0.85 billion Mainly
cards Total 1.4 billion Total Value 1.22 billion
Research from RFID Forecasts, Opportunities
Players 2006-2016 IDTechEx www.idtechex.com
15
Short Range Passive RFID Examples
16
(No Transcript)
17
Example Gillette razor packs
18
The Electronic Product Code (EPC) System

• EPCglobal
• Managed by GS1
• Standardisation of EPC tag types and common
  infrastructure
• Over 920 sponsor companies

RFID Tagged Products, Cases or Pallets
19
Real Time Locating Systems locating things
without them going near a reader Example Time
Delay of Arrival
TaggedAsset
To System
Reader
TaggedAsset
Example tag WhereNet
100m
Long Range (50 to 100m) - Ability to
locate tags - Resolution decreases in crowded
environments. - Difficult to translate in
crowded environments. - No ability to write to
tag at distance. - Expensive infrastructure
(many readers, expensive processing) Examples
20,000 complete cars, Ford Dearborn.
Defibrillators in hospitals
Source Savi Technology Inc and IDTechEx
20
Zonal RTLS Cell ID
RF Coverage
RF Coverage
Radius 15m
Radius 15m
I
30m
RF
RF
RF
RF
50m
RF Coverage
Building 1,500sqm
IR RDR
RF RDR
LF RDR
17 IR RDR, 4 RF RDR
21
RFID Value Chain 2006
Horizontal (selling to anyone)
Vertical (specialising)
Licensors of inventions and consultants
Chips
Chip antenna modules
Label rolls and dispensers
System Sellers and Integrators
System Operators and Facilities Management
CHIP TAGS
CHIPLESS TAGS small business as yet
Deposited thin film RFID
Interrogation Electronics
Software
22
(No Transcript)
23
RFID enabled phones Near Field Communication

• New mobile phone technology is enabling users to
  pay at vending machines, sing karaoke, ask
  information from posters etc.

24
Example Smart Shelves trials
A smart shelf system for DVDs in a Tesco
supermarket in the UK that has increased sales by
4-10 due to reducing stockouts
25
FREQUENCIES good things
Standard for cards, tickets, passports,
libraries, laundry etc
Standard for air baggage, pallets, cases
Standard For livestock
26
RFID without transistorsHidden Electronic
Product Code (HidE)

• Concealed printable memory for item level
  identification.
• Compliant with RFID EPCTM Tag Data Standards
• Integrated to the package structure
• Can be integrated to other functionalities
• Tamper evidence, temperature sensing
• Short range reading method (range up to mms)
• A local electric field generated by a reading
  device
• HIDE is decoded in less than a second when it
  passes through the field

Defined by EPCglobal IncTM
27
Experimental fully printed RFID labels -
insulating, semiconducting, conducting and
protective patterns
Offset litho, flexo, ink jet and gravure being
tried 8-128 bits read only 52 companies
working on this
28
Global Potential (Billion/Year)
RFID Leadership
Library 0.1 Singapore Museums, art
galleries 0.1 Europe Laundry 0.1 Europe Animals 1
Thailand, S America, US, Eur. Tires
1
Europe Tickets

1 Japan,
Europe Cards 2 China Military items

2 US Blood 2 Europe/US Test tubes
2
Europe/US Archiving
paperwork 2 US Air baggage 2 US, China Air
freight 2 US Drugs
30
US Pallets, cases 40 US,
Europe Books 50 Japan Postal 650 Europe Retail
items 10,000 Europe/Japan/US
ITEM LEVEL IN RED
29
IDTechEx Forecast for Item Level Tags (Billions)

• 2006 2008 2012 2015
• Most likely 0.2 3 100 550

30
For further information read
RFID Forecasts, Players, Opportunities
2006-2016 Active RFID 2006-2016 Item Level RFID
2006-2016 Real Time Location Systems
2006-2016 The RFID Knowledgebase Over 2000 case
studies listed and growing every month.
Covering more than 2200 companies, 81
countries Learn from the successes
and failures of others www.idtechex.com Tel
44 (0) 1223 813703